by Zoë Archer
She gathered him close, and felt the tension slowly leave his body as his arms wrapped around her. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
He sighed, and touched his forehead to hers. His breath fanned warmly over her.
“I can’t be cavalier about death. Mine or yours.”
She gave a humorless laugh. “My word on the Three Sacred Tablets, I have no desire to wear the pala wreath.” Her hand came up to trace the side of his face, feeling the bristles along his jaw and tracing the contours of his mouth. “There’s too much in the realm of the living.”
He started to speak again, but she silenced him with her lips. Resolute, yet tender. She explored his taste, his feel, learning him anew every time. Being able to kiss him now, when so much had stood in their way or interrupted them, was a rare luxury she fully intended to take advantage of.
Even with her reputation as Stainless Jur, she hadn’t hidden her sensual needs. She never saw the necessity to play coy, or pretend that she didn’t have sexual desires. Yet with Nils, she felt herself utterly letting go, giving full power to the demands of her body—and heart. She leaned back, pulling him with her, until they lay on the platform. Her hands moved up the tense sinews of his arms, raking her nails along his skin, and he groaned into her mouth at the sensation.
Fevered with wanting, she gripped his shoulders, feeling the bunch and play of muscles. He moved so that his body lay atop hers, his legs between hers. She hooked her ankles over the backs of his thighs, so that they were locked tightly together, hip to hip.
She barely felt the platform beneath her. Her awareness clung only to the weight of Nils, the feel of his body, the taste of his mouth. She tilted her hips and moaned at the sensation of his fabric-covered cock sliding over her. They rocked together, a delicious, maddening tease. Her hands drifted from his shoulders to run over his slick, straining back. The bandages frustrated her—she wanted to feel every part of him—yet they reminded her of the courage he demonstrated again and again. He never retreated. Like her, he met every challenge.
And, at that moment, their clothing was the challenge. They both struggled partially upright, tugging on the fastenings of their uniforms. She sighed with relief as she peeled back the clinging fabric, pulling her arms from the sleeves and pushing the uniform top down to her waist. Then lower, taking the one-piece garment down her legs. She hesitated for a moment.
“Don’t stop,” he urged. “I want you naked.”
“I want to be naked. But I’m not sure what to do about my boots.”
“Right.” He glanced at the surrounding jungle. “Hostile environment.”
“Might need to be dressed and running at a moment’s notice.”
“And we’ve seen what’s crawling across the jungle floor.”
She growled. “Damn.”
He grabbed her hand, kissed it. “It’s all right. I want you however I can have you.”
It wasn’t going to be elegant or pretty, but she pushed her uniform down so it gathered around her calves. “If I’m going to look this ridiculous, you do too.”
His eyes gleamed in the darkness. “You don’t look ridiculous. You look…real.”
“Then you’d better get real, Lieutenant Calder.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Nils also partially undressed, and in the dim radiance of the moonlight, she saw his narrow, uncovered hips, his bare legs. And his cock, upright and thick.
“Gods,” she breathed, “what I wouldn’t give for a full-sized lys-lamp. Even simu-candles. I want to see you.”
“It’s said that other senses compensate when one’s diminished. Touch, for example.” He reached for her, and she went willingly as they pressed together tightly.
She gasped at the feel of his bare cock rubbing against her. Some minor shred of modesty had kept her panties and tank top on, but the synth-silk fabric of her underwear was far thinner than her uniform, and it was almost like naked skin against naked skin. She felt the heat of his shaft, the smooth head, even the tiny droplet of moisture gathering at the tip.
With his clever engineer’s hands, he pulled off her tank top in a swift motion. And when those same hands gathered up her breasts, both Celene and Nils groaned in pleasure. He traced her nipples, bringing them to hard beads, and lightly pinched them. On a moan, she arched up.
“My senses are replete,” he rasped. “I feel you everywhere. But, gods, I’ve fantasized about this for so long. And now that I really have you, I can’t see you. I don’t even know the color of your nipples. They could be light or dark, and I’ve got no way of knowing.” He all but growled his words.
“Dark,” she managed to gasp as he plucked on them, sensation traveling straight between her legs.
“The color of flame plums, or açaberries?”
In the haze of her arousal, Celene had to laugh. “Trust you to remain fixated on quantifiables.”
“Want the full range of experience.” He bent his head and circled his tongue around her nipple, drawing forth another moan from her. “You taste sweet as an açaberry.”
“Tawnyfruit,” she breathed. “My nipples are the color of tawnyfruit.”
“My favorite.” He sucked the peak of her breast into his mouth, and she threaded her hands through his hair, holding him close.
“Lucky for me.”
“Lucky for me. But you could’ve named any fruit at all. Whatever you said would be my favorite.” Then he stopped talking, his attention fully focused on bringing her pleasure.
And he did. She’d been touched before, by men and by machines designed for pleasure. But nothing felt like this. With his incisive mind and skillful hands, only Nils could draw such pleasure from her body. They had been wanting this for far too long, and she felt his freed desire in every caress. She writhed beneath him as his mouth and hands moved over her in hot, lush exploration.
But she was a pilot, and not without her own sense of discovery. She touched him everywhere—wide shoulders, lean arms, the hard musculature of his back and lower. Beneath her palms, his buttocks tightened, and she gripped him hard. At some other point, she wanted very much to sink her teeth into that delicious ass, but that would have to wait for another time. Right now, she was famished, and the means of sating her hunger lay tantalizingly close.
She edged back enough to give her hand room for more journeying. Traced the ridges of his abdomen and the muscle that ran from each hip. Following that muscle led her to his cock, and he hissed in pleasure when she wrapped her fingers around it. He was marvelous in her hand, the living energy of him. She stroked him, up and down, giving a little twist at the head that made him groan and clench his teeth.
One of his hands dipped beneath the waistband of her panties. Finding her wet, he murmured words in a language she did not recognize, only judging by the tone that they were words of worshipful praise. She tipped her head back and made a breathless, pleasured sound. They touched one another like this, his long fingers caressing her, her hand stroking him. With his free hand, he continued to toy with her breasts, and she thanked the countless deities that he excelled at multitasking.
She felt her climax gathering. Yet abruptly he took his fingers from her. She growled her protest, though it died when she felt him tugging down her panties. She widened her legs as much as she could, and pulled him closer. He resisted, however.
His large hand covering her pussy, he murmured, “Taste. The most powerful sense.”
“No, no.” She tried to twist away. “We’ve been stomping through this inferno all day. I haven’t…” She felt herself blush. “I need to bathe. A UV shower, at least.”
Nils rolled away, and she heard him delving into one of the packs. The sound of tearing foil made her frown in curiosity.
He rolled back and held up what appeared to be a rectangular piece of fabric. “Cleanse-cloth.”
“That’s for cleaning weapons.”
She felt his smile. “Works on people too. I’ve done tests.”
Of course he had. And she certainly
appreciated his thoroughness when he dipped the cleanse-cloth between her legs. The fabric was cool, moist, and it felt like the next incarnation of ecstasy as he slowly, sensuously stroked her with it. She thought she might feel embarrassed to have someone tend to her personal hygiene, but the way Nils touched her destroyed awkwardness and left only pleasure.
“Give me…one of those…cloths.” She wanted to perform the same service for him.
He shook his head. “Another time. Right now, I’ll go nova unless I taste you.”
The cleanse-cloth disappeared. And was replaced by Nils’s lips.
She pressed a hand over her mouth, trying to stifle her moan. But she found herself unable to stop the wild, hoarse sounds that broke from her. She couldn’t hold herself in. Nils devastated her.
He didn’t lick at her pussy, nor press kisses there, as other men might. No, he ate at her, using his whole mouth—his lips and his tongue—to devour her. Drinking, nibbling. Feasting on her. He took her clit between his lips and sucked. He lapped at her, greedy and delicate, as if she was the most delicious thing he had ever tasted. The tip of his tongue circled and dipped into her opening, firming to enter her. He fucked her in savage reverence with his mouth. Over her own furiously muffled cries, she heard groans of pleasure deep in his chest.
Her hips rose, and he pinned her down, commanding as he adored her. With her free hand, she clutched a slat of the platform, her grip tight enough to make her hand ache. She didn’t care. She was the center of the universe, all heat and pleasure.
Release tore through her. An explosion of sensation that left her a charred husk, shuddering and breathless.
But not utterly spent. Even as the last tremors shook her, she recovered enough strength to pull him up for a deep, open kiss, tasting their flavors intermingled.
“Now it’s my turn to take the controls,” she growled.
He smiled against her mouth. “Ma’am, yes, ma’am.”
“On your back.”
He did so. It took some negotiating, with their uniforms tangled around their legs, but she had skills as a pilot, and maneuvered herself to straddle him. She felt more than saw the intensity of his gaze as he stared up at her, his hands on her hips, his whole body taut with need.
“If anything interrupts us now,” she breathed, “I’m going to lose my mind.”
“Nothing can stop us.”
“Better not.” She pressed her hands against the hot contours of his chest. “I want you. So much.” She’d never known need like this, that drove away all thought. All boundaries.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said, hoarse.
“It’s too dark to see.”
“In the darkness or the light, you’re beautiful.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, her heart too full and aching. The demands of her body wouldn’t let her retreat, however. She angled herself to precisely where she needed to be, and then sank down, taking him inside her.
The sensation… It engulfed her. She couldn’t hold in her sounds of pleasure as he filled her. He made feral noises, deep, masculine growls that traveled in waves through her body. They both kept still, as if stunned into immobility by the wonder of him within her, the feeling of their bodies intimately joined. Immobility couldn’t last, though. Not when an even greater pleasure arose as they moved.
He was thick and hot within her, and as she lifted up and moved down, radiating pleasure suffused her. At first, she moved with slow deliberation, savoring each slide of him. Her pace soon quickened, and he bent up, thrusting into her with deep, full strokes. She lost herself in sensation, freed from expectation, knowing she could be entirely herself with him.
She bent over him and rode him hard, just as he drove up with an unrelenting strength, and she could see enough to watch his head thrown back, the column of his neck and underside of his jaw, as his mouth opened on rough exhalations of pleasure.
Her orgasm stole thought, and seemed to obliterate the confines of her body. She felt herself everywhere, in every thing, in herself, in Nils, in the living jungle, and the sky overhead and the stars and planets scattered throughout. And as she expanded outward to encompass everything, he joined her, groaning out in release.
How much time passed, she couldn’t measure. There was only before making love with Nils, and after, and she found herself at some point carefully dressed, tucked against his side. They lay together on their platform, looking up at the star-filled sky.
She had a brief, panicked desire to grab him by the hand and drag him back to the Phantom. They could find a tiny, barely inhabited world and make a home for themselves there, hiding from PRAXIS, from the 8th Wing. Alone and alive.
But she pushed that desire aside. It was a fantasy, a dream that could never happen, for even if they could somehow evade the 8th Wing and PRAXIS, neither she nor Nils could turn their backs on duty.
Chapter Ten
On an elevated ridge, Nils and Celene took up a position. Each trained silmät scopes toward a point to the east.
Marek’s compound. It perched at the edge of the jungle, three of its sides surrounded by dense forest, and the fourth side facing the seething ocean.
Even from a distance of a geomile, it was evident that the waves would destroy any vessel foolish enough to brave them. Dark shapes of creatures also lurked beneath the surface of the water, large creatures who formed massive shadows under the waves. One of the sea-dwelling beasts breached, snapping up a low-flying animal, and Nils cursed to see numerous rows of jagged teeth gleaming in the beast’s mouth.
“Rules out a water approach.”
A thick perimeter wall enclosed the compound, with plasma wire atop the wall. No one could breach the wall, and if one attempted to scale it, the wire grid would reduce them to atoms. Should someone be lucky enough to get past the outer fortifications, he or she would find themselves amidst a series of buildings. A large main structure, surrounded by two smaller outbuildings.
At one corner of the compound was a landing pad. A medium-sized cruiser already occupied a spot there.
“Place looks deserted,” Celene noted. “No guards patrolling. But his ship is there.”
“Robotic sentries.” As Nils spoke, three mechanized sentinels traversed the compound, their blaster-mounted turrets continuously sweeping back and forth. “Marek’s paranoid. He already didn’t like working closely with others in Engineering. Makes sense that he’d create a haven free of all people.”
“Except himself.”
He nodded grimly. With a suspicious, intelligent mind behind the design of the compound’s security, it would make his and Celene’s objective that much more difficult. Cracking the defense systems would take all of his skill and focus. But getting inside was merely the first step. Once he and Celene did manage to get in, they would have to contend with the sentries. And Marek, himself.
Yet with only a few geomiles separating Nils from the traitor, he knew that turning back wasn’t an option. Marek had betrayed the 8th Wing, had almost cost Celene her life and freedom. For that, the traitor must be punished.
“Did you bring the holographic projector?” Celene asked.
Lowering his silmät scope, he pulled the device in question from his pack. He and Celene had discussed their plan before leaving the Phantom, with him making the necessary adjustments to their equipment. The implement would project the hologram of two Black Wraith ships, making it appear as if the ships approached the compound. Careful calibration ensured that, for a few minutes at least, the signatures of the projected ships would appear real to other sensors, presenting enough of a perceived threat to distract Marek. Nils and Celene would breach the perimeter during the distraction. Once inside, they would find the Black Wraith disruptor device and destroy it.
As he set up the projector, he fought to keep his attention solely on the task. His mind kept drifting back to last night, the all too brief pleasure they had shared. They had slept in shifts, and all he had wanted to do was lay beside her, sleep with her in hi
s arms. But he’d had to stay awake and vigilant for his shift, and had kept himself alert with running scenarios about the mission.
If he and Celene survived, if they made it back to base, would they have more nights like the one they shared? Or had it been a one-time event, never to be repeated? Would she even want to be seen with him?
A scene played out in his mind, clear as a high-def vid: him, walking down a corridor on base, seeing Celene with her Black Wraith buddies coming toward him. Pretending he didn’t exist. Her gaze never meeting his.
Could NerdWorks and an ace fighter pilot really make it? He wasn’t sure, and she hadn’t said anything about what might come after the mission.
Damn it, don’t think about that now. Just get the gear set up. Then survive the next thirty minutes.
“Might want to delay the projector,” she said. “Another distraction has arrived.”
He glanced up and cursed. A PRAXIS clipper appeared on the horizon, and seemed to be heading straight toward Marek’s compound.
“The hells…?” Nils turned his scope up to the PRAXIS ship. “This planet’s a lot more popular than I’d thought. Or Marek serves a really nice cup of kahve.”
“It’s not kahve that brings PRAXIS here.” Celene growled. “The bastard’s going to sell the disruptor to them.” Which was precisely what the 8th Wing feared.
He and Celene shared a look. “Lucky we showed up when we did. We can prevent the sale.”
“Yes, but it also means the timing of this operation has accelerated. We’ve got to get into the compound and destroy the disruptor before PRAXIS can get its hands on it.”
Immediately, he and Celene jumped to their feet. After securing their packs and checking their weapons, they jogged down the rise, and began pushing hard through the jungle, toward the compound.
“Marek will drop some of the shields to permit PRAXIS to land,” he noted, shouldering aside several hanging vines. “We won’t need the holographic projector.”
She remained stone-faced, the look he now knew well. Her battle mask, behind which she retreated to get herself in the proper mindset for combat. It had nothing to do with him. Taking his cues from her, he forced icy calm to thread through his body and mind. He could think only of achieving success, and not dwell on what may or may not happen afterward. Doubt had no place on a mission. Particularly one with stakes this high.
